


A Lone Pearl

by writer_zo



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 07:36:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19102612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writer_zo/pseuds/writer_zo
Summary: Asra has a very special question for his Apprentice. Yes, this is a proposal fic. (Apprentice is female and named Jenna—commission for @aoi-hina on Tumblr!)





	A Lone Pearl

The sun slips behind a coil of cloud, white as ivory and soft against the pale violet hue of the dawning day. The placement of the heavenly bodies creates a soft dove tint about the room, a sleepy silver that settles into the cracks in the floor and covers the world like a blanket of quiet. Faust lies at the base of the bed, curled up at Jenna’s feet, her sides pressing gently against her toes: in, out, in, out. The effect is mesmerizing, calming. The apprentice can feel her heart rate lowering again, close to falling back into slumber.

She feels the weight behind her shift. The arm around her, strong and warm as a sapling in summer, draws her closer. A face is pressed into her hair, a soundless breath ruffling the hair and settling at the nape of her neck. A smile blooms on Jenna’s face. Asra. Strong and alive at her back. The memories that surfaced in the still lake of her mind caused her no pain, no headache, a relief she had come to savor like a cool breeze or a bite of fresh bread.

_“I’m fine, I swear!” Jenna had been working, poring over the latest book that Nadia had gifted her. The writing was lovely, of course, but the real prize was the illustration: the author, with a caring had and a precise brush, had illuminated the entire text with gleaming pigment, with foxes that darted into tufts of underbrush, with fish that leapt and sparkled from azure water, with twisting cats and white serpents that smiled from edge to edge._

_Asra had smiled, shaking his head at her, and cocked an eyebrow to the shadows overtaking the world outside. “It’s getting late, Jenna. I have something planned for tomorrow.”_

_“We’ll do it. Can’t I just have a few more minutes?” Jenna glanced down toward the book, finger tracing a swooping owl the color of fresh cream._

_“Well, I can’t exactly force you to get your rest. But…”_

_“But what?”_

_“I’m almost sure you’re nodding off as we speak.”_

_“No, I’m not.” Jenna felt the pull of sleep on her eyelids, a physical weight that made her head nod and her lips purse to fight a budding yawn. She managed to keep it at bay, and stuck out her tongue at Asra, teasing. “See? Wide awake.”_

_“Well, I’m convinced. Carry on. Burn the candle at both ends, why don’t you?” Asra joked._

_“I will.” Jenna had said, resolute, turning back to her novel with eager hands._

Asra had been right, of course. She wondered how much longer she had been able to keep her eyes open before Asra had found her, probably face-down in the work, sleeping as though under an enchantment. She would have been embarrassed if he weren’t pressed against her now, nestled with her under the wooly fabric of the covers. She looped a hand into his, feeling how his thumb traced a circle around her hand, up, around, up, around.

“So…” Asra murmurs, barely audible above the sighing of the wind outside and the birds beginning to come out to sing. Jenna feels him smile against her skin and rolls over to face him, blinking with drowsy contentment.

“Don’t you start.” Jenna mock-pouts, pulling herself closer with a quirk of her lip. “I know, I know, you were right about me falling asleep. That book is just… I mean, I got a little distracted. You know how I am when--”

“Shhhh.” Asra lays a finger over her lips: it smells of rosemary and incense, of powdered herb and cedar-wood. It’s a familiar, almost haunting sent, one that makes her feel entirely at ease, a moth in a cocoon. “I’m not here to gloat. In the end, I was glad I let you do that. When I saw you lying there, curled over the book, with a little happy grin on your face, well… it reminded me of just how in love with you I am, Jen.”

Jenna feels her face tinge pink, her mild indignation fading like a droplet of water turning to vapor in a faint stream of sun. She leans forward and presses a sleepy kiss to his lips, and he makes a sound of happiness, leaning in to savor her touch. When he pulls away, she stared at him, just inches from her face, the way the light sifts through his hair and dances along his high, gold-toned cheekbones. His eyes are the color of the center of a forget-me-not, an achingly beautiful blue-violet that shines at the corner of Jenna’s mind at every moment. His eyes are shot through with stars, and she takes great pleasure in counting them.

“You’re beautiful,” she says, reaching a hand upward to ruffle his hair.

“Not half as beautiful as you.” Asra leans in to press a kiss to her forehead, then sits up, slowly. Jenna feels his arm slide from her back to her face, caressing it, and opens her eyes fully to see him sitting above her, bare-chested, face alight with an adoration that makes her feel alive deep inside.

She settles into content silence, looking at him as he gazes at her, and then he is moving, up and away. She groans, reaching a hand after him from the comfort of the bed.

“Where are you going?” She sighs, closing her eyes against the slowly brightening sun.  
“I was thinking that we could… walk. I’ve found a very special place.”

She smiles up at him and gestures to the window. “Asra, it’s just after dawn! Surely it can wait. Faust and I are still very happy right here, and we could use a third person to even things out…”

Faust slithers off of the foot of the bed, and he catches her, placing her onto his shoulder with care. He turns a wry eye to Jenna, clearly amused.

“Traitor,” Jen says, as the white serpent flicks out her tongue, almost like laughter. Asra chuckles, eyes trailing to the doorway.

“Usually, I’d let you sleep. However… today I have something important to show you.” He moves to nudge the cover from your shoulders, a slight hint of nerves making his fingers twitch. “I’ll leave you to get dressed. I promise to make you whatever you want for breakfast afterward.”

“We’re eating afterward?” Jenna asks, feigning horror. Asra laughs, pulling away to prepare for a walk. Jenna wonders what he means by “important.” It can’t be any kind of threat--can it? He seems so happy, but there’s an undercurrent of anxiety that gives her pause.

Well, she’ll know soon enough, right?

“So long, bed,” she sighs, patting her pillow and leaving the warmth. The floor is icy against her bare feet, and as she opens the window, she realizes that the weather is taking a turn for the chilly this morning.

“This had better be very important,” she sighs, but know that if Asra is taking her there, it will be.

\---

“Really, now, where are we going?” Jenna asks, as Asra leads her by the hand.

He turns back to look at her, eyes twinkling. He’s brought a knapsack, filled with some of the food he’d promised: pumpkin loaf, fresh apples, even a small box of Vesuvian Delights, delicacy candies made with gelatin and powdered sugar. Her clothing, usually warm, are still chilled by the thin trails of mist that have made their way through and into the town from the sea, but she doesn’t want to turn back.  
Asra keeps smiling at Jenna, ready to tell her something. To share something new. She has done so much of that with him: in their first years together, when they were falling in love, when he first felt an undying fire for her, and then again and again, until the plague came to riddle her body with pain and she was placed in the Lazaret. She feels a shiver travel down her back, but it doesn’t have anything to do with the cold.

She woke up in his arms. That’s her first memory after her death: waking up in his arms, alive and well, warm in the embrace of her former master. She was so disoriented, without her past or direction, and in that moment, his arms felt like the only thing keeping her from vanishing forever into the sand of the beach.

Since then, she only felt truly secure when he was nearby. When she was falling asleep, she thought of him, praying that he would be there for her if she woke up alone, remembering a scorching heat, pain, the darkness around her.

She loves him. She’s loved him for so long, through every masquerade and dance. Hearing him say that she was worth everything to him had made her feel as though she were a part of heaven itself.

It’s a strange, quiet walk, one mixed with equal parts excitement and apprehension and love. She slows as they come to the place where the roads and houses give way to the damp sand, spattered with salt and shells that flicker in the haze of the rising sun. She hadn’t realized--they’d walked farther than she’d expected.

The surf is gentle against this small edge, this bay that leads out to the deeper ocean. She shivers as the droplets rising from it evaporate and sift into her lungs, savoring the warmth of Asra’s hand. He turns back to look at her, hair shot through with beams of light like the fluff of a dandelion, seeing how she pulls her shirt tighter and shifts her feet.

“Are you cold?” Asra asks, seemingly unfazed by the little specks of water that cling to his lashes. Jenna shakes her head, a lie that doesn’t go unnoticed by Asra as she rubs her free hand against her pocket, absentmindedly trying to retain feeling in her extremities. He stops, causing Jen to bump into him ever so slightly from behind, and then reaches for her other hand, taking it.

“Close your eyes. I can help you,” Asra says, moving to better hold her hands. She takes one more look at the tone of his irises, then closes her own. She can feel the warm outline of a kiss against her skin, pushing away the droplets, and then the unmistakable push of magic, a whispered word that seems to echo even against thin air.

Starting from the site of the kiss, heat travels in a rush down her body, spreading like the roots of a tree along her spine and into her arms. The sea air no longer chills her, and she opens her eyes to Asra smiling, his eyes glowing almost with purple light imperceptibly in the dawn.

“Thank you,” she says, face flush with the spell.

“No need to thank me. I’d do anything for you,” Asra says, moving a strand of oak-dark hair from Jenna’s face. Faust perks up from her perch on Asra’s shoulders, excited by the spell, her head tilted to the side in curiosity. Jenna laughs, scratching the snake’s chin, and watches as Faust shuts her eyes in pleasure, tongue poking out.

“I guess we’re both pretty easy to please,” Jenna says, savoring the sudden lack of numbness in her fingers and toes. “But really, Asra, what is it that we’re going to see? The suspense is starting to kill me. You’re killing your girlfriend, Asra.”

Asra laughs, nudging her with his arm. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I swear that I would take you another time if I could.” He begins to walk again, leading you down and onto the spread of the wide open beach. The water is a deep lapis-lazuli blue, hemmed in by a wavering line of seafoam. The leaping bands of white sunlight caught at the crest of each waves remind Jenna of Faust, how she slinks around, always shadowing Asra like a friendly ghost. A smile bubbles to her lips. She hates to admit it, but she’s glad she woke this early. She has almost never seen the sea like this, and not with Asra by her side.

The place where they stop is just in front of the surf, just close enough to brush Jenna’s feet when the waves come all the way in. It is the place where mottled gold sand gives way to smooth, pale brown earth, all of its edges rubbed away by the water like clay under a potter’s hand. He puts a hand on her shoulder, and, for a long moment, gazes out to sea, where the rising sun melts into the water in a phantasmal haze.

“What are you waiting for?” Jenna asks. Other people might think she was lost in thought, but she knows: he’s waiting. That particular expression of Asra’s, one of waiting for something ineffably important, was one he’d worn for years and years, every time he thought that she couldn’t see him staring at her, waiting for recognition, for her to remember something, anything.

“Hmm. It should be in very soon. I guess I’ll have to say something first.” He turns back to her, his whole face alight with a smile. His hands find hers once again, and her heart rate quickens. It just feels so right.

Nerves flicker across his face as a blush glows rosy on his cheeks. He hesitates one moment longer, looks to Jenna’s hands, and begins.

“Jenna… for many years, we lived together. Worked together. Learned magic alongside each other. The line between student and--” he winces, not wanting to use the word you called him for so many years. “And, well, ‘master’ was blurred. I learned so much by watching you. I think I learned more than I ever taught you. You’re a marvel, Jenna.”

“Asra,” Jenna says, rubbing one foot against the back of her ankle. A smile quirks the edge of her lip up. “Stop it, or I’m going to swoon. I’m warning you now.”

She doesn’t ever really want him to stop. But she does feel weak in the knees under his gaze, and after he throws his head back and laughs, white hair forming a crest behind him. Dimples appear on his cheeks as he steadies himself, looking back to her with a mischievous smile.

“I think Faust knew how I felt before I did,” he says, and you feel warmth in your chest. “She took a real liking to you, very quickly. And so did I. It just took me a bit longer to realize it.”

“It was so gradual,” he continues, “that shift from seeing you as a companion to… something a lot stronger than a companion. It was like working for a long time to get a fire going, then having it catch the moment you look away for an instant. It was so sudden, and yet… I think it was there all along.”

No jokes come out of Jenna’s mouth this time. She bites her lip, wondering what’s happening to make him act like this. His love is getting under her skin, heating her up more than his spell ever could. Could his words be laced with magic?

No. No spell could make this more real.

“I think it was there, too,” she says, leaning forward to rest her forehead against his. “Whenever I had a glimpse of my life with you, when I was still barely able to remember anything… I felt so much love. You, wanting to protect me. Was I right?”

“Yes,” he breathes, looking into your eyes. Tears spark in his own, reflecting stars, violet in the dawn light. “I tried so hard, Jen. I wouldn’t let anything happen to you--that, I promised myself. And yet I did. I’m powerful, Jen. I’m a practicer of magic, a diviner, a trusted one among the arcane spirits of the world. And when I heard what had happened to you, I thought… I felt like a broken toy. Useless.”

Jenna leans forward to kiss him, wiping the tear that falls from his left eye with a nudge of her hand. It’s breaking her heart to hear him like this: so angry at himself for a crime he didn’t commit, for a disease no one had known how to cure.

“You got me back, Asra,” she says, and he nods into her hand. “You were clever, and brave, and kind. And you brought me back. I could never fault you, Asra. I owe you my life.”

“That was going to be my line,” Asra says, smiling softly. “I owe you my life, too. I owe you all that is good in my life, all the stars, a thousand years together. Jenna, I love you. I love you enough to bring you back from death, to bring you back from anything that would try to take you away.”

“I love you too,” Jenna says, breathless. “I love you so much, Asra.”

He captures her in a kiss, and for a while, the whole world melts into nothing at all.

The cry of a gull rouses her--and him--from their reverie. Asra’s eyes trace her face for a moment longer before he looks out to see, a knowing look on his face.

“A gull’s cry,” he says, looking out to the surface of the water. “That’s the spell’s signal, if I’m correct about all of this.”

“All of what?” Jenna asks, dazed from his kiss. She manages to snap out of it as he steps back from her, resplendent in his smooth tunic and morning glow. “Asra, why are we here? Not that I haven’t… well. Not that I haven’t enjoyed it immensely.”

“It’s coming in now,” he says, nodding to the waves.

A perfect sphere of water, around the size of an apple, rises from the surface of the sea. Its surface becomes almost pearlescent as it rose, catching the light and refracting it in a thousand different directions. It bobs over to Asra and settles in his hands--Jenna peers into it, fascinated, and thinks for a moment that she can see something in the center.

“Jenna,” he says, “I didn’t only ask you here to tell you how much I love you. I want to show you. The spell I casted earlier, the one I’m holding in my hands… it finds the most flawless pearl in the sea, and returns it to the caster. I created it for you.”

“Oh, Asra, you didn’t have to--” Jenna smiles. He shakes his head, surprising her into silence, and rubs a circle against her hand with his thumb.

In a spark of magic, he lifts the orb of water to her, allowing the water to fall away in an enchanted spiral to the surf. Her attention is quickly diverted from the water that spatters against her feet when she sees what was inside: a winding band of silver, culminating in a perfectly smooth, shining pearl at the top.

“Asra?” Jenna breathes, scarcely able to believe what she is seeing.

“My love,” he says, dropping to one knee, “will you marry me?”

For a moment, she’s entirely quiet, hands over her mouth. Frozen by shock. Asra’s smile falters--he seems to wonder for a moment if this is too far, if he’s done too much.

Then Jenna throws her arms around him, and he exhales all at once, laughing. He pulls his hands through her hair and lifts her into the air, spinning around, as she presses kisses to his cheeks, to his face.

“Yes!” she yells, holding his face in hers. “I love you, Asra, I want to spend the rest of my life by your side.”

“I love you, Jenna,” says Asra, extending the ring to her. She extends her hand, watching it glimmer as it slips over her finger.

“Does it fit?” He asks, breathless.

“Perfectly,” she says, pressing a warm kiss to his lips, chapped by wind and the brine of sea air. “As perfect as you.”

 

 


End file.
